What are PVC Strip Curtains?
PVC Strip Curtains vs Curtains
PVC Strip Curtains are almost exactly what they say they are on the tin. They are just like your window blinds at home, in that they are in strips and hang from the top of the door or window or opening.
The difference between your normal curtains and the PVC Strip Curtains are that they are made of PVC and are a lot heavier. The see through material acts as a window whilst allowing people to pass through it quite easily.
Business Recession
As a country, we are currently facing a double-dip recession which is making most businesses re-evaluate the tightness of their purse strings and look for ways to save themselves some extra money.
There are many ways a company can save money through making changes to the way the business runs. Many businesses will first look to make savings through cuts in advertising, but this is not always the best approach to take. Less advertising or advertising in other places might be a good way of saving money in the short term, but long term it could affect the amount of new business you attract and so lead to further cuts. Cutting staff levels is another solution many companies resort to, but this will only decrease staff morale and so productivity across the business.
PVC Curtains can help reduce costs
Energy bills are forever on the increase, costing businesses more and more with every hike in price. The first thing to do in order to save money is to go over the running costs of your business, can you change the efficiency of the light bulbs you use, make sure things like air conditioning and heating are properly regulated and making sure each piece of electrical equipment is turned off at the plug. These seemingly trivial checks can actually make a big difference in the long term. The other option is to look at ways of insulating the premises, which is where PVC strip curtains can become very beneficial. PVC Curtains are exactly what the name suggests, long and narrow strips of weighty PVC which are hung together to form partition walls or strip curtains. PVC is incredibly flexible and so when hung together as strip curtains, the weight and flexibility of each individual strip means the curtain falls together seamlessly, leaving no gaps.
PVC Curtains are great insulators of heat, the PVC material used in creating strip curtains stops heat from transferring from one area to the next, so they are often used in an environment which requires a certain amount of temperature regulation. PVC curtains are mainly used in the industrial and manufacturing sectors of business because they are very hardwearing. In this type of setting they have a number of uses which can help to cut costs on energy bills. If you have ever seen a warehouse or storehouse, the first thing you will have noticed is the sheer size of these buildings. Inside the appearance is no different, huge vast storerooms which require particular ambient temperatures depending on their intended use. Just lighting and heating a building of this size can cost a small fortune, so thinking about insulation might not be top of the priorities list. Many warehouses have large windows towards the top of the building to allow the sun to cascade through and light up the otherwise dark building. These windows are generally single glazed, so as you can imagine they let out a lot of heat. Using normal curtains in a place like this would be absurd, as they would get dirty, but also block out most of the natural light. As PVC strip curtains have great insulating properties but are also completely transparent, hanging them over large warehouse windows in areas that are heated would allow the same amount of light into the building, while blocking in most of the warm air, decreasing temperature dispersion and lowering the cost of energy bills.
Strip Curtains make life easier
a warehouse
In industrial environments strip curtains really can make everyday operations run much more smoothly, especially in situations where constant access between two different areas is required at all times, but a different environment is needed in each area. For instance in a food processing plant you may have a situation where two areas need different ambient temperatures due to the food that is being stored there, but still need access for vehicles such as pallet trucks, lollops and forklifts to collect goods ready for shipping. In a warehouse you might have a partition which splits the two areas and leaves an access way large enough for these vehicles to pass through. Using a door in this situation might not be feasible, especially given the tight budgets most companies in the industrial sector are working to. A large manual door would have to be insulated, which costs money, but also means your drivers are going to have to open the door before their vehicle can pass through then shut it before they can continue. Needless to say this is a lot of time wasted. Automatic doors are a much easier option for everyone, but they aren’t going to come cheap and actually even an automatic door is less effective in this situation than a PVC strip curtain would be.
Whenever you have a door in an access way you are always going to be losing energy each time the door opens. Even if the door is automatic it is still going to open up to its full capacity, in which case there is plenty of room around the object of person passing through for heat to transfer. Using a PVC curtain removes a lot of this heat transfer though having a much smaller opening. As the PVC curtain is pushed through, the individual strips part only enough to let the object pass through them leaving very little gaps around the edges of the object, thus letting a lot less heat disperse between rooms. Also once the object or person has passed through, the weight of the PVC strips causes the curtain to fall back into place in a matter of seconds, less time than it would take a manual or automatic door. And the cherry on the cake….PVC curtains cost very little to produce, take almost no time to install and require little maintenance.
Why PVC?
This is a question that is often asked about any product made from PVC. Why choose to use PVC over any other plastic compound? Well there are a few reasons for this. Firstly PVC is known for being one of the most strong and durable materials on the market today. It is used in the production of all sorts of different products, from PVC Halloween costumes all the way through to Pop up Display banners and PVC Curtains. Aside from the obvious strength and durability, there is also the fact that PVC is a great insulator of heat, sound and is also waterproof. For the purpose of strip curtains, PVC is the material of choice also because it has a high level of flexibility which means it can be bashed around, pushed through, bent and parted without causing stress to the individual strips. Other materials may have some of these same qualities, but none have the perfect combination which makes PVC the only material to make strip curtains.
Calling all Cottage Industries!
A PVC curtain is ideal in an industrial setting, but not all industries require large warehouses and processing plants. Businesses like joiners and carpenters exact most of their business from a workshop environment, which is a much smaller scale than your normal industrial business. The other main difference is that they will also generally have some form of front of house in order to showcase their work and arrange new appointments with clients. Due to the smaller size of workshops, often you will find all of the different parts of the making process happen in one open space, which can leave issues of contamination from one area to the next. For example in a joinery or carpentry workshop you will often find the measuring and cutting, the fitting and the finishing will all take place in the same floor space, so how can you stop bits of sawdust and wood chippings flying off machines and being carried onto a freshly varnished job? This is where PVC strip curtains really come into their own.
A PVC curtain does not need to be limited to covering doors and access ways, they can actually be used to create partition walls to segregate different areas of a business. In a workshop you might choose to split the floor space into three or four segments, one for each part of the making process. This means that the belt sanders and pillar drills are not going to be kicking out sawdust which might disperse into other areas, the PVC curtain would help to contain the debris while still allowing an easy passage from one area to the next.
Use a PVC strip curtain to improve your customer experience
The usefulness of PVC strip curtains is not limited to the industrial sector, they can actually be used in a more commercial setting. Although it may sound a little strange that a strip curtain designed to withstand constant barrages of vehicle access can also be used in shops and offices, but it is not as strange as you might think. One of Britain’s biggest consumer commodities is the fast food restaurant, which for the main part are open at least 12 hours of every day.
Many takeaways in the UK do home delivery but also allow their customers to eat on the premises or carry their food out. These type of places are very difficult to protect against many common pests including rodents and insects, using a PVC strip curtain over the entrance or exit to the kitchen can help with this situation. For example, in a takeaway restaurant very often the door to the front of the shop is left open which means there is plenty of opportunity for unwanted guests such as insects to fly in through the front of the shop and into the kitchen. Because of how heavy a PVC strip curtain is, it would be impossible for most insects and small rodents to make their way through, so increasing the general hygiene of your kitchen. PVC curtains are also good insulators of noise, so having a strip curtain in the door between the front of your restaurant and the kitchen will also help to improve your customer’s general experience. Admittedly not many people go to a takeaway for the general atmosphere, but sectioning off the noises and conversations from the kitchen is still a good way of enhancing the experience your customers have and is effectively a bi-product of the protection from pests.
PVC Strip Curtains are easy to maintain
The best thing about PVC curtains is the low maintenance required to keep them in good condition. If the strip curtains are being used in an industrial environment, then your main concern is with visibility. In this instance the strip curtain would only require a wash down now and again to ensure visibility is not impaired on either side of the partition. If the curtain is being used in a commercial environment which handles food, then the curtain would need a thorough Wash daily to maintain food hygiene standards. Installation takes no time at all and so your business will hardly be affected, if at all. As each of the strips that make up the curtain are individual parts to the curtain, should a strip get damaged, only that one damaged strip needs replacing.
PVC strip curtains can make a big difference to the running of any business, for more information or prices on PVC curtains or PVC Crash doors please visit our website.
